I’ve long been a fan of Local H, and I’m not the only one. They were a staple on the speakers at Colt Mondays when we used to duck down under his lofted bed and play songs (using Winamp, naturally) on Downtown Evan Brown’s computer.

Local H is a band straight out of the early 90’s – they’re an obvious example of what the grunge movement would’ve continued sounding like if it hadn’t died out with the deaths of Cobain, Staley, with a big assist from the corporate record labels’ over-saturation of the market with inferior bands and ham-fisted fidgeting with the format. ‘Bound For The Floor’ was always a mainstay as we huddled up in Evan’s room, but we also loved ‘High-Fiving MF’ (which could now be Tom Brady’s theme song – GO PATS!) and of course – ‘Eddie Vedder’.

The band is still very active, and they’ve done a TON of covers over the years – and I’m always a sucker for a good cover – so I decided to put as many as I could find together into a playlist for you (but really for me) to enjoy. They’ve released one whole album of just covers so far (Local H’s Awesome Mixtape #1) and have another in the works and set for release soon. If you know of any more good covers they’ve done, please let me know, and I’ll add them to this list. I also included some of their original favorites in at the end to round it out.

So here you go: Local H’s version of tunes from The Misfits, Lorde, The Pixies, TV On The Radio, Wolfman, Concrete Blonde, Pink Floyd, Rush, and even Britney Spears! Now all we gotta do is get them to cover ‘Damn It Feels Good To Be A Gangster’ by the Geto Boys and I’ll name them Colt Monday’s House Band for life.

If I was only allowed to eat one thing for the rest of my life? Kalamata olives. NEXT!

Both Jason Moberg & Hutch were VERY correct.

The Lorde episode of South Park was confusing but hilarious, and the series remains one of the best shows of all time.

I actually enjoyed “Prometheus.” Sure, parts of it was dumb, but over all it was great.

Yes, I’m glad The Walking Dead is back to being “watchable” TV, but it still drives me crazy to think how much better it would be if Darabont was still running things. (Nicotero is a hack.)

This song is helping me get me through a lot of tough spots during my unemployment, as I am questioning myself and my lot in life. But this song gets me out of my funk, and when it comes on, I still sing at the top of my lungs and dance like an idiot. And yes, I still like it, the entire album is amazing.

I’m a 35 year old grown man, and I don’t care what you think. That song’s AMAZING.

I’m also partial to Meghan Trainor. Don’t judge me.

Key & Peele are GROSSLY underrated. Best sketch show I’ve seen in years. They’re CRUSHING it right now.

I’m really upset I missed out seeing this guy when he came to Great Scott’s in September.

I’ve got really good people around me. Thanks to all of those who stepped up for me recently, and not-so recently. I truly appreciate it.

I really want to see The Book Of Mormon.

You want a good rock band to listen to? Check out The Heartless Bastards, The Districts, and The Vaccines.

Italian Roast coffee is the best coffee.

Chevy is putting Wifi in cars. Because THAT’S something we need.

During my time between jobs, I have started running. During my first week of trying it out, I overdid it – and I vomited in front of a school bus full of children. Their dueling cries of disgust and amazement still ring in my ears, and I want to apologize to them.

I always thought I’d move around a lot as an adult, working in radio and all. That’s what you do – you take on-air jobs all over the place (there’s always a gig in podunk little towns) and hope to move up into bigger markets. When I was younger, I liked the idea of being a nomad, but now that I’ve got a kid and found a great town to live in (Winchester).

I’d like to stay here a bit while longer.

The Red Sox are a dumpster on fire rolling down a hill – yeah, they’re fun to look at and talk about and all sorts of stuff is happening with them, but they’re still going to stink.

As much as I want the Celtics to be good this year, they won’t be until Jeff Green and Avery Bradley are traded off the team. I don’t know what Ainge sees in them, exactly. They’re both solid players, but they’re not worth the minutes they’re taking away from other players with higher ceilings who could use the experience and the shots. They need to go young NOW. #PLAYJAMESYOUNG

Once you stop caring about what other people think, Country music is AWESOME. Yes, even the new stuff. Just enjoy it, don’t overthink it. Yeah, a lot of it is formulaic, but so is all the tedious drone-synth indie-rock I was trying like hell to enjoy before I started listening to my boy Blake Shelton.

I’m not kidding. Blake Shelton is my spirit animal. If you can’t enjoy that guy, you don’t like fun.

Muffins > Scones. By A LOT.

I’m Greeker than Greek Yogurt. That stuff is straight-up lying to folks. And GoGurt!? It’s JUST REGULAR YOGURT TOO!

Shows on HGTV make me anxious, but they’re like televised crack to my wife and her family.

Mikey would love Griff, and vice-versa.

I pride myself as someone who only likes to drink a little; the only problem is that when I drink, I turn into someone who likes to drink a lot.

The Patriots are going to win the Super Bowl this year IF Brady stays within himself.

LeBron James continues to be all that is wrong with sports. With Johnny Manziel his little underling-in-training.

If you have doubts about somebody having your back, never trust them to have it, because they won’t.

There is simply no one likeable on the Bruins, besides Patrice Bergeron. The rest of them seem like fratted-out meathead bros. Don’t get me wrong, I want them to win, but rooting for them individually is hard to do. Lucic is the worst of them. I hate that guy.

I can’t believe how lucky I am. My wife, family and friends have all come through for me in a big way. I couldn’t do this without them.

2014 has been the best and worst year of my life.

I’m hoping 2015 is just as exciting.

Once you get over Andy Samberg’s teeth, Brooklyn Nine-Nine is a damn funny show.

I really hate eggnog.

There’s no way to get tar completely off the bottom of a sneaker.

Teddy Bridgewater will be better than Johnny Manziel, after all is said and done.

Shandies > anything pumpkin, but we should all relax on the over-flavoring of beers.

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If the Heat had won last night, this would’ve made more sense,,but I made the above GIF instead of doing meaningful stuff, so…. here you go. Oh, and I hate David Stern. Yes, he’s no longer the NBA Commissioner… or at least, that’s what he wants you to think. I still believe he’s pulling the strings behind the scenes – either by fixing the Draft again for the Cavs so he can finally get that Cleveland/Miami rivalry off the ground, or getting the refs to call a foul on any Spur brazen enough to scowl at his beloved pet & meal ticket “King” James during these NBA Finals. I believe he swung the league to favor Jordan, then Kobe, and now LeBron – because they are his stars, and he wants to set the narrative to the most lucrative setting possible, and that doesn’t happen when teams are allowed to dictate the outcome of the NBA.

He’s always given off the vibe he could use a good ass-kicking at the mitts of a bubblegum-less Roddy Rowdy Piper, so I decided to do this mashup of his ugly mug & stills from the classic 80’s horror flick “THEY LIVE”. So, you’re welcome, I think?

The WWE does an amazing job helping making sick childrens’ dreams come true, and this recounting of the final days of “Connor The Crusher” illustrates that perfectly, and also hits you right in the feels with a sledgehammer.

My kid will grow up watching wrestling. It’ll be a great bonding experience, as I LOVED wrestling as a kid – even if I had to sneak down ninja-style from my bedroom to watch it, because my mom was horrified by it and thought it would rot my brain. But The Macho Man Randy Savage was my idol, and whenever my brothers and I would tear the cushions off the couch and beat the ever-loving shit out of each other, I’d alway climb up on the armrest, point to the sky with both arms, and then attempt the flying elbow.

Yeah, it was stupid and dangerous – we knew that – but it WAS FUN. That’s all wrestling is. Big stupid fun that helps you escape reality for a few fleeting moments. And kids, especially terminally ill ones – need that.

These guys are worth supporting publicly. What they do in and out of the ring is amazingly difficult and challenging. There’s no shame in what they do.

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After foolishly stoking the coals on Facebook and bringing up the anti-vaccination debate, only to be engaged by people who 1) can’t even put a proper sentence together, let alone a cohesive argument, and/or 2) think EVERY damn thing is a government conspiracy – I’m just going to leave this here.

There is no legitimate scientific controversy about whether or not vaccines are safe. The original study that started us down this insane path by linking the MMR vaccine to autism has been retracted outright. The evidence against administering the MMR vaccine to healthy individuals is utterly without merit.

But people continue to make the utterly baffling choice to refuse it anyway. Dispiriting new information seems to indicate that they are immune to persuasion when confronted with facts inconvenient to their worldview. Indeed, writers at prominent online media outlets chide us for “demeaning” vaccine-deniers, saying to do so “defies explanation.”

The explanation is simple, and is as accessible as the nightly news. Vaccine-deniers are responsible to the resurgence of once-eliminated illnesses. Their movement is responsible for sickening people. They are to blame for the word “outbreak” appearing in headlines from coast to coast.

The anti-vaccine crowd may think they’re only making a decision for their own family. In fact, they’re threatening to make the rest of us sick. Refusing to vaccinate your children means you are contributing to a worsening public health crisis. There is no denying it, and there is no point in sugar-coating it.

So yeah, Stevie, me & a bunch of buddies have hopped on the Movember Mustache Ride (wait… there’s gotta be a better way to phrase that.) If you could look deep into your soul (and pockets) and help us raise money for Men’s Health research, we’d really appreciate it. Thanks. To donate and/or check out all the other team members and their awful awful mustaches, click here!

That was an ass-whuppin’ by Houston – no question – and more are in store. Ainge and Stevens can dispute it all they want, but this team is already in full tank mode.

While I don’t like it, I can understand tanking for THIS class coming up. Jabari Parker, Marcus Smart, Joel Embiid and the biggest prize of all: Andrew Wiggins. If we suck long and hard enough, we’ll be GUARANTEED at least one of those players. But you have to be the worst team in the league, which I think we are, without Rondo.

Sidenote: DON’T TRADE RONDO. This team would be TEN times better if they had him on the floor right now. We’d be talking about sneaking into the playoffs with him healthy. The talented parts (Jeff Green, Olynyk, Vitor, Sullinger…) are there, but there’s nobody to get them the ball. Avery spends way too much energy trying to get the ball up the floor, and he should never be allowed to play the point. EVER. He’s terrible at it. He needs to be guarding 2’s and scoring 1’s, and playing without the ball in his hands. Rondo’s the steak here, the rest of them are all side-dishes.

Oh, and trade Humphries already. That shit’s EMBARRASSING. Whenever I look at our roster, and I see his name there, it’s like seeing your mom’s vibrator sitting on her nightstand because she forgot to put it away.

We posted it on Facebook a few weeks ago, but in case you missed the announcement, here it is. Our first collaborative effort has a tentative release date of March 8th.

I’m not going to go soft on you; we know and are fully aware people have babies all the time, and we’re NOT going to act like we’re the first couple ever to do it and rub your faces in our exuberant glee. That’s annoying. We ain’t those kinda folks.

There will be no ultrasound pictures posted here or on Facebook. That’s gross and weird.

No positive pregnancy tests, no “me holding her swollen naked pregger belly while we gaze lovingly into each other’s eyes” photoshoots. That’s weird and gross and stupid.

I pretty much summed up my feelings on all of this during a “That Guy” rant a few weeks ago on the show. Listen to it here.

So yeah, it’s happening. We’re very excited, Amanda for obvious reasons… and well, I’m jazzed I’ll finally have someone to play video games with! Also, it means I’ll get to do stuff like this:

If it’s mine, then yeah, poops are going to be the highlight of the day, too.

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I know he’s just making nonsense noises with his mouth, to mimic rapping, but… I kinda jammed out to this for a bit. The crazy part is that he’s ACTUALLY laying down those beats on a drum pad/keyboard thing… and they’re REALLY GOOD.

Or am I nuts? Maybe the bar has been lowered SO DAMN LOW by the crap that’s out there for hip-hop right now, but this sounded good to me. Here’s another one where you can definitely see him play the instruments:

Let me start by saying that I had a blast at this weekend’s edition of Boston Calling, the awesome music festival down on Boston’s City Hall Plaza. I (and a lot of fellow, like-minded music fans) got to see a ton of great bands, like Local Natives, Vampire Weekend, and Passion Pit over two days, and the people who put on the festival do an AMAZING job.

It’s too bad one of the bands who “performed” took the opportunity to shit on their fans and an opportunity to connect with the other people in the crowd. Then got all pissy when I voiced my displeasure on twitter.

I showed up early on Saturday, specifically for Deer Tick. I WAS a big fan of the band. Some great songs, and some very listenable albums are out there. They’ve got a new one dropping in a few weeks, appropriately called Negativity.

Well, they get up on stage, and the lead singer – who’s really the songwriter/impetus behind the whole band; a guy named John McCauley, from Providence – lackadaisically just mumbles into the microphone, quote “Uh… we’re just gonna play the new album front to back, and there’s nothing you can do about it.”

Oh. Well, fuck you too then, pal.

He proceeded to do as promised, and wasted an hour of festival exposure playing an album NO ONE HAS HEARD YET OR IS FAMILIAR WITH. It doesn’t come out for another 2 weeks – but I can tell you, after listening to this performance, it sucks and it needs a lot of work. It’s slow, and meandering, and BORING. Nothing like his uptempo stuff, and nowhere near as good of a record as War Elephant or even Divine Providence, which he totally should’ve played.

Look, everyone hates it when a band you paid to see plays new stuff at a concert (after all, we all wanna hear the hits), but it’s expected that if they have a new album out, you’re GOING to hear one or two songs from the new record. That’s understandable. But to play a FULL album full of ballads? At a festival? Where a ton of people aren’t familiar with you, and you have a chance to bring a TON of people onto your bandwagon if you rock some new faces out in that crowd? You don’t do it.

It was a dismal set, and when the nicest thing people can say about it was how it was “neat” you brought one-hit-wonder Vanessa Carlton on-stage with you for a song because you’re dating her, it’s a bad sign.

You play your good, fast, familiar stuff at a festival. That’s Music Promotion 101. You do stuff like Matt & Kim did during the first Boston Calling session back in May:

Well, that’s very scenester douchebag of him, isn’t it? Not “Sorry you didn’t like it” or offering some sort of explanation or reasoning. He pretty much made a wanking motion at me through the internet. Turns out this guy has a history of doing stuff like this and might be a little sensitive when it comes to criticism. Sounds to me like someone’s got a MIGHTY big opinion of himself, don’t it? Oh, and it gets worse after I fired back.

@deertickmusic well that's good. A raging ego without established success always works out. Being jerks to supporters is smart too /sarcasm

… and let’s be clear: They are NOT a successful band. Yeah, you can sell out clubs in Providence. So could Buddy Cianci’s hairpiece. It’s not that hard. This guy has been getting a little bit of buzz from the Pitchfork crowd and all of a sudden he thinks he’s the fucking Rolling Stones. You’re not there pal, and with an attitude like this, you’ll NEVER get there. Maybe you say you want it that way, in typical hipster fashion. Fine. I hope I can help oblige.

Hey, I didn’t do so bad last year! I nailed all but one team in the conference title games, and I called Doug Martin having a big year. With that said, let’s just go ahead and ignore my prediction of the Bills making the playoffs last year, ok?

Our public transportation system here in Boston (The MBTA) is corrupt, bankrupt, & terribly inefficient; so instead of putting money towards fixing those problems, they made this hot mess of a safety video instead, because OF COURSE THEY DID.

The money that was spent putting this together would’ve been better put towards bringing back the Night Owl, wouldn’t it?

This playlist has the new Deltron 3030 in it (which isn’t as great as I’d hoped it be, to be honest – but it’s still better than 95% of other hip-hop right now.) plus the new Avett Brothers single and some Willy Mason, too!

I went down to the Seaport World Trade Center for Boston Comic-Con this weekend. We talked to loads of nerds, dorks, geeks and dweebs! Here’s some photos and videos (in the form of vines) that we shot on their exploits.

Whoops. Forgot to post last week’s playlist, so here you go. It was a good one, too. I really like Crystal Stilts, and The Districts is a bunch of kids still in high school! That Papa song is great, too.

As far as this week, I’m trying to let the new RJD2 grow on me, but I’m a big fan of fellow Vineyarders Family Of The Year and that Boots Electric record.

My wife loves owls. They’re actually giving giraffes a run for their money in terms of her affection lately. (Seriously, she’s brought home 4 ceramic owl figurines in the past two months alone.) Me? They scare the bejeezus out of me. These fuckers are airborne velociraptors with built-in sonar. Sure, they’re cute as babies, but they quickly turn into winged harbingers of doom.

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For Mikey – 1978-2009

One of the founders of Colt Monday (Both the website and the weekly Emerson "soiree"), Mike Morrison passed away in May 2009. He was the best friend anybody ever had. It might not be much, but this website is dedicated to his memory. We love you and we miss you, Mikey.